Cox’s Orange Pippin Apple

Cox’s Orange Pippin is a medium-sized, fresh-eating apple. Its thin skin is yellow, with a reddish-orange blush on it and some russeting.

Its flesh is yellow, fine-grained, firm, and very juicy. To some people, the taste is almost spicy. The apples are very fragrant. Sometimes, in the internal core, the seeds are loose and you can hear them if you shake the apple. That means the apple is ripe.

The tree blooms late, so its blossoms can avoid damaging late spring frosts.

In North America, Cox’s Orange Pippin is mostly only planted by home gardeners.

Cooking Tips

Commercially, you can produce about 600 litres of juice per tonne of Cox’s Orange Pippin Apple.

Nutrition Facts

Per 100 g (3 1/2 oz)

Amount

Vitamin C

10.5 mg

Storage Hints

Stores well.

History Notes

Cox’s Orange Pippin was developed about 1825 (some sources say 1829 or 1830) from the seeds of a Ribston Pippin by Richard Cox (1777 to 1845) in Colnbrook Lawn, near Slough, Buckinghamshire. Richard Cox was a retired brewer.

The original tree lasted until it was destroyed by a storm in 1911.

The apple was introduced about 1850, being promoted by Charles Turner, who developed the Grenadier Apple and the Arthur Turner Apple.

Received a prize in 1857 from the Horticultural Society of London (later to be called the Royal Horticultural Society.)

Received Award of Merit and a First Class Certificate from RHS in 1962.

The Cox had been the most popular in Britain throughout the 1900s. In 2007, almost 25% of the apple market in England was still for Cox’s [1]. By 2011, however, it had been overtaken by Gala apples, when British supermarkets sold 22,000 tonnes of Gala apples, compared with 21,600 tonnes of Cox.